A new music project targets a San Antonio 1960s music icon: Sunny Ozuna, known by most for his work as Sunny and the Sunliners.
Musicians recently covered some of his songs which will be released next month.
New York record label owner Danny Akalepse came across Ozuna's music a few years ago and decided he had to meet him.
"He's a big deal in the Chicano soul scene, that's for sure," Akalepse said. “In 2016, we flew out there [to San Antonio], interviewed and hung out for a couple of days."
He said Ozuna lived up to what he expected, and still has his chops.
"He's a really nice guy with big fans. And, you know, he's a living legend," he said.
Akalepse says back in the day Ozuna re-invented himself on every record, in one of four different genres.
"It wasn't it wasn't like he was keeping up with the Joneses, it was more like he was covering those four bases at all times," Akalepse said.
The producer assembled what he thought was the best of Ozuna's soulful ballads and released an album on Big Crown Records.
"We did the first release in 2017, a compilation call Mr. Brown Eyed Soul,” he said.
Label co-artists were introduced to Ozuna's music and liked it so much they cut their own versions of Ozuna's songs.
"And that comes out September of this year right before his 77th birthday," he said.
And here's the angle that many San Antonians would be interested in.
"We would love to do some new music with them as well. That would be amazing," he said.
If they do that, we will keep you posted.
Jack Morgan can be reached at Jack@TPR.org and on Twitter at @JackMorganii.
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